Cimbrian grammar and orthography
The following description of Cimbrian grammar refers predominantly to the dialect of Lusern. Phonology and orthography A star represents sounds that are used by those who speak the Lusern dialect outside of Lusern in strictly Italian areas. Notes on orthography:' * All dialects of Cimbrian use different orthographies though all are mainly based upon Italian and German orthographies with some additions from other languages and do not drastically differ. * Diacritics and graphemes common in German and other languages are mostly utilized for sounds that do not exist in Italian. * Diphthongs are written as in Italian whereby, for example, ''drai 'three' is written in contrast to the German Drei but is pronounced the same. * [k] is rendered as in standard German as k'' while the grapheme ''ch is reserved for the sound [χ]. * [g] is rendered differently according to dialect: ** In the Thirteen and Seven communities, g is rendered as in Italian - g'' (which goes to dʒ before e and i). If g is to be kept before a vowel, the writing must change to ''gh. ** In Lusern, g is rendered mostly as g, perhaps due to more familiarity with German in Lusern. Though, seeing ghe and ghi is not uncommon. Morphology, Syntax, Other Nouns in Cimbrian, as in German and other German dialects, have three genders - masculine, feminine, as well as neuter. Cimbrian makes use of the nominative, dative, and accusative cases. The genitive case was formerly used but has now been replaced with the use of the dative + vo ('of'), a similar case which can also be seen in modern German. Cimbrian nouns inflect for gender, case, and number, usually keeping the same patterns for even Italian loanwords ending in -a, - o, and -e. Nouns also have forms for diminutives. Cimbrian articles (both definite and indefinite) have long and short forms depending on stress. Examples of Cimbrian noun inflection (with long articles and German counterparts) can be seen below. Note: å is equal to an open back unrounded vowel. Cimbrian verbs are inflected for person, number, tense (present, past, future), mood (indicative, subjunctive, conditional, imperative, infinitive, gerund, and participial), and voice (active, passive). In regards to conjugation, Cimbrian shares many aspects with many other upper-German dialects. As in these other dialects, the use of the preterite has been replaced by the perfect which is formed with the prefix ga-'' (''vallen ‘to fall; gavallet 'fallen’). Infinitive verbs have two forms, a simple infinitive as well as a dependent infinitive which is formed with zo. An example of this can be seen with the verb 'to fall': vallen - zo valla. In the Cimbrian of Lusern's present indicative, 1st person plural as well as 3rd person plural are both formed in the same manner as the simple infinitive, just as in standard German. Thus vallen acts as the infinitive, 1st person plural, and 3rd person plural. The 1st and 3rd person plural also match each other in other tenses and moods. The syntax of Cimbrian shows measurable influence from Italian; however, it still shows German traits which would be completely foreign to Italian speakers. An example of Italian influence is seen in the fact that Cimbrian does not move its verb to the second position as in German: * My friend* believes that he '''can win. (En) * Moi txell gloabet ke dar mage vinzarn. (Cim) * Il mio amico crede che può vincere. (It) * Mein Freund* glaubt, dass er gewinnen kann. (Mein Freund can also mean My boyfriend) (De) * My brother went on vacation in order to relax. (En) * Mio fratello è andato in vacanza per rilassarsi. (It) * Moi pruadar is gånt in vakånza zoa zo rasta. (Cim) * Mein Bruder ist in Urlaub gefahren um sich zu erholen. (De) Cimbrian, in most sentences, uses SVO ordering, similar to Romance languages, however, in some cases it adopts some German word ordering. External links * Category:Language phonologies